Family Room HTPC is setup finally

Some weeks ago I posted that I would be installing a home theater PC in my family room. I wanted it to be easy to use and completely family friendly. My entire family can use it, including my wife who doesn't share the same love for technology as I do.

I installed a custom 46" 1900x1200 wide screen display with a Voodoo ARIA. We had a frame built around the 46" to maintain the "art" effect and the ARIA is flush mounted below the screen. The system is fantastic, I have a set of 5.1 Creative Labs speakers hooked up and it's all ready to roll.

The Voodoo ARIA can be configured online with multiple drives, and it includes a fantastic DVD archival system. It also uses the latest Turion 64 processor from AMD which makes it deadly silent. I can't even tell when the PC is on in this configuration, it's very deceiving.

Eventually I will be posting an article about HDTV, Satellite, OTA Satellite and all the rest when I get a chance to play further.

ENVY-ous fans at the Singapore airport...

Here's an interesting letter from a long time Voodoo customer based in Calgary. He recently purchased a Red ENVY to take with him travelling.

Hi Rahul (from New Zealand):

The Envy really is. The red colour especially has captured the attention of most of the folks I've come into contact with. Definitely the centre of attention. You'd have loved the situation in the Singapore airport. I was sitting there playing with my Envy and checking out the free wireless access (which is only really free if you want to access the websites of the stores in the airport). We were sitting beside one of those long, horizontal escalators (walkway). A large planeload of Japanese men was coming down the walkway and they all (like a flock of birds) took a long look at me (probably the Envy?), heads turning in a wave as they swept by. It was weird and really cool. Would have made a great ad for you. Anyway, it's all working really well.

Just some random thoughts. Have a great holiday season.

All the best. Cheers!- Ron

I've been there before. I always get stopped and questioned at airport security not for any other reason than the agent wishing to know more about my laptop.

Could Chevy turn things around by going back in time?

The above image is a 1965 Impala SS Coupe, slightly modified. This was the turnaround year for the Impala as it began to lose its flair over the following years.

Chevy may be in the midst of turning around their business. It wasn’t a few weeks ago that I was speaking with some friends during a dinner conversation about Chevy. I felt that Chevy should really go back to what made them cool in the 50’s and 60’s by re-creating inspired designs which really made them cool at the time.

I always thought it would be nice to see the old school Impala make a real comeback. Lately it seems that the employees at Chevy have lost all inspiration to design a ride the way they used to. They been creating alot of models, no doubt, but they're uninspired at best. I can't even remember any of the model names of many of their new cars because they are so generic.

The Bel Air and Impala were some of the coolest cars that Chevy ever released. In fact, in the 1960’s the Impala was one of the most successful cars for Chevy. They kept changing it though, year after year. After about 1965 it started to lose its flair, and they just kept butchering it even more until it was finally discontinued. They then re-released it, and they ended up with, what I feel, is a crappy looking commodity imposter wearing an Impala badge. Unfortunately the only similarities between the old school Impala and the new Impala is the name.

It’s about time they figured out their business and went back to what really made them successful. It seems to me that if executed properly we should see Chevy make an interesting turn around over the next couple of years.

Now might be a good time to find a steal deal on a 1964 Impala SS hard top or convertible. Check out what CNN has to say.

Rogers came through (sort of)

I must give credit where credit is due.

I posted about my trouble with my Blackberry device that I purchased roughly 7 months ago. Well a supervisor from Rogers phoned me out of the blue and offered to upgrade me to the new Blackberry 8XXX series for an additional $500. I went ahead with it because I really need a working device.

The good news is this device kills the other Blackberrys by a long shot. With Edge support, an awesome screen, a better keyboard, and a faster processor there is really no comparison to anything I have used to date.

I am still looking forward to Microsofts entry into the instant push mobile email market and I will likely make the switch sometime next year.

I am actually mobile blogging with this new Blackberry as we speak.

Our Brand is Catching on in Interesting Ways

Here is a true story about an Apple MAC user named Douglas.

Douglas emailed me a month or so ago requesting vector art images of our Voodoo Tattoos as he was considering getting the Voodoo logo tattooed on his body. It’s certainly believable, as we have had a few tattoo artists compliment us on our designs in the past. I also recently got the Voodoo Classic Tattoo and Logo on my leg.

Immediately I had James from our marketing team email all of our vector art to Douglas for him to choose the design that he wanted, and he said he’d be getting back to us later.

Douglas is not a Voodoo customer, but he is a fan of Voodoo, he really enjoys our industrial design, brand elements, and overall image. He has been following Voodoo since about August of 2005, so he’s a relative newcomer, and he was introduced to Voodoo by a friend of his. Douglas works with a major Apple reseller, so he knows his way around a computer.

So, today I received an email with the pictures of the final tattoo and I was given permission to share them online.

NVIDIA buys ULI? Makes sense to me.

While other chipset manufacturers are witnessing big declines in the demand for their technology, ULI is developing truly unique chipsets which surprisingly offer similar performance to NVIDIA nForce4 and ATi Crossfire Chipsets (which we have yet to qualify). ULI also includes additional features to boot, like 7.1 high quality audio, and better USB performance (compared to ATi).

The enthusiasts all know that NVIDIA owns the performance chipset market, there are no currently available chipsets that offers the same level of stability, performance, and features of nForce4. By taking over ULI, NVIDIA just locked their position as the premium performance chipset manufacturer. Trying to find the key and unlock their lead isn’t going to be an easy task.

Even when you compare Intel latest chipset with NVIDIA nforce4, there is no denying that nForce4 is better due to the fact that it supports both Crossfire and SLI based solutions for real. In fact, if not for NVIDIA, Intel would have likely been pitched out of the gaming space altogether earlier this year.

To confirm, we have been able to successfully qualify the ATi X1800XT in Crossfire on an nForce4 based motherboard with very little trouble. The flexibility of this chipset combined with the fact that nForce4 can be adapted with both AMD and Intel is fantastic.

The way I see it, NVIDIA is creating the standard and perfecting it at the same time. If I were VIA, SIS, and ATi I would take notice at what NVIDIA is doing right and try to emulate it somehow. VIA and SIS need to drop some of their baggage off at the nearest airport before they can think about competing again. I think ATi is close; this time around they have made some big improvements in their chipsets however with NVIDIA buying ULI the NVIDIA nForce4 team seems to be unstoppable at this point.

You don't really need a crystal ball to see where this is going.

Do you recognize this girl?

The movie "Grandma's Boy" is about a game tester who is forced to live with his grandmother and her two old friends after getting kicked out of his own apartment.

This lovely lady is one of the characters in the show. This is a behind the scenes shot of her getting ready for a take. ...but wait! What's that on her desk? Could it be a custom painted Voodoo ENVY with a butterfly tattoo? Perhaps, I believe there are many Voodoo computer sightings in this movie.

I haven't seen the movie, but I did get a chance to read part of the script. It looks to be pretty funny, after all it is an Adam Sandler produced "Happy Madison" movie. It will be out in theaters early January so look forward to it! Judging by the initial reactions on various blogs it's not looking to break the bank, but it's a step in the right direction and certainly a unique fresh perspective on movies.

Your ticket to the Mile High club?

John Mellow is a well known tech journalist. He loves technology, and he seems to like the recently introduced Voodoo ENVY a:538. ..and why not? This unit includes a 1900x1200 display, and it's powered by the AMD Turion 64 Processor. It's thin and light, and really fast, and it's reasonably priced (for a Voodoo).

His review is over here at Technewsworld.

The Monster “Conroe” Cometh – Should AMD be worried?

I have received numerous questions about Intel’s future roadmap, and whether or not AMD should be worried. I have been in this business since 1991 and I cannot remember the last time a big company leaked out a roadmap, revealing almost every detail, one year in advance of releasing products.

It makes me wonder exactly why Intel allowed this to happen. Perhaps they needed to implement immediate damage control as they continue to lose market and mind share in key areas. Releasing a detailed roadmap like this could be an effective tool in casting doubt in people’s minds whether or not we should buy AMD now or wait until later to buy Intel.

My father always taught me that it is typical of the underdog to reveal all their cards -- that's a pretty profound but true statement.

Should AMD be scared? Judging by the details coming from Intel I would venture to guess that Goliath is trying to throw a smoke screen in front of David. However, with details on Intel’s future Conroe featuring 4 megs of shared cache, dual core technology, 65 nanometer process, and proposed 3GHz+ debut (more likely 2.5GHz) it would seem to me that anyone would run scared – although this would be more “scary” if AMD sitting idle doing nothing.

I do believe that Intel will be back on the train tracks sometime next year, but that should be obvious considering the fact that they have all but derailed this year. I’m pretty sure there will be a few surprises from the green camp once again.

The bottom line is Conroe may look scary on paper, but so does ATi Crossfire. Until we start to see some real product launches we’ll never know for sure. Although Intel has always been pretty good about releasing products on time, this roadmap is pretty bullish so only time will tell. AMD is remaining pretty quiet about their future plans, but REV F looks to be a tight platform. I don't think people realize how insane REV F is going to be, but I'm pretty sure it will please the most die hard enthusiasts.

In the meantime I don’t think there’s any question as to who is winning the battle these days. There is no doubt in my mind that AMD will continue to gain ground (read: marketshare) for many months to come.

I’m a big fan of low voltage chips from both AMD and Intel.

I can’t wait to start designing new systems based on some of the upcoming technologies. Competition is heating up, and 2006 should be the most interesting year ever.
One last thing, speaking of "REV F" (I can just see the AMD communications and PR team teeth clench everytime I refer to it as "REV F") - sorry guys. I plan to write an article about it pretty soon so look forward to it.

OMEN Elemental on the cover of CPU Magazine

Wow it's been a few days since I've written something. I had to travel down south for some business meetings and I arrived back in Calgary early this morning. I left a nice warm climate only to arrive to Calgary where it's -25 degrees Celcius. That's way too cold.

Our Gold OMEN Elemental was featured on the cover of CPU Magazine this month. It's a great read, they did a multi-page review featuring the OMEN and all the extras that it ships with. This machine isn't cheap, it sells for roughly $15,000+ so it's certainly not for everyone. You can make a pretty good OMEN machine for less money without the gold finish, signature edition, and all the rest.